


right here

by chocomelon



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Angst, Angst and Tragedy, Car Accidents, Character Death, Grief/Mourning, M/M, MatsuHanaOi Frienship, seijoh third years
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-01
Updated: 2020-03-01
Packaged: 2021-02-28 11:54:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,159
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22969609
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chocomelon/pseuds/chocomelon
Summary: He should’ve listened to the road safety instructors. The car should’ve been watching for pedestrians. The fog shouldn’t have hung low. A phone shouldn’t have light up at that exact second. It really shouldn’t have.It does.
Relationships: Iwaizumi Hajime/Oikawa Tooru
Comments: 13
Kudos: 70





	right here

**Author's Note:**

> EDIT: changed from first person to third person, minor grammar and punctuation
> 
> Also, [Kizuato](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e6uOkHm8vcQ&ab_channel=%E3%82%BB%E3%83%B3%E3%83%81%E3%83%9F%E3%83%AA%E3%83%A1%E3%83%B3%E3%82%BF%E3%83%AB) by Centimillimental, which is the OP for Given, was my main inspiration while writing this. More so because the manga for Given was written by the famous iwaoi doujinshika, Gusari.

_There’s a shopping bag filled with Tooru’s favorite branded milk bread swinging in Hajime’s hand as he crosses the street. The road is unusually empty. Tooru can hear him thinking it. Hajime has this stupid smile on his face thinking about how he’ll react to the five packets he just bought on the way back home from work._

_There shouldn’t be a car driving straight ahead. There really shouldn’t. It’s a quiet night. It’s not Hajime’s fault he crosses the street without looking both ways because it almost looks like a ghost town and he doesn’t hear anything, not the tell-tale gust of wind that signals movement nor the soft drag of wheels against asphalt._

_He should’ve listened to the road safety instructors. The car should’ve been watching for pedestrians. A phone shouldn’t have lit up at that exact second. It really shouldn’t have._

_It does._

_His body is a mangled ugly thing beneath the car, drowned in blood and barely human. Bones are showing and limbs are halved and skin is grazed and peeled. Tooru can hear himself screaming, an ear-splitting cry that pounds in his head._

Hajime’s voice brings him back to reality. “You’re okay. I’m right here.”

There’s a wetness gathering in the corner of Tooru's eye but Hajime brushes it away, murmuring sweet nothings as he pats the bed-ruffled mess of brown curls. Tooru would be cracking a joke right now, about how Hajime's being so uncharacteristically gentle but every thought dies in the back of his throat with the horrific vision of these same arms torn and bloody. His warmth around Tooru is a reminder of his life, each breath against his neck its own reassurance.

Tooru buries into his arms and wills himself to forget. The blankets keep them safe for now.

“Be careful,” Tooru says.

“I will be,” Hajime smiles. “I need to come back to you, after all.”

He is not careful enough.

The ringtone of Tooru's phone later that evening is a shock to his routine. He almost never gets calls these days, never need to because he replies to texts so reliably fast. This call sounds like a warning to his ears. His dream from last night plays behind his eyelids, seeming more real than this moment. He picks up the phone hastily. Something must be really urgent. Really bad.

It is. It’s so bad he thinks it can’t be real.

It is.

The hospital is too white, too clean, too sterile, too _much_.

_‘It’s not real. It’s not real. He’s not d– He’s not. He’s alive and well and he’ll laugh at me for being so worried.’_

He shoves through a small group near ER not out of desperate concern but in disbelief.

_‘You’re wrong. You’re all wrong. He’s fine.’_

There is no chaos. The entire hospital is in the eerie calm of post-surgery: no hasty nurses, determined surgeons, anxious receptionists.

 _‘_ Do _something. Why aren’t you all doing something? He’s still alive. You have to keep trying to keep him alive.’_

The metallic, tangy scent of blood permeates into the hallway from the room.

He hurtles into the room with all the momentum of his down-corridor run but collapses onto his knees, frozen almost immediately.

The sound that escapes his throat is barely human.

It’s his Iwa-chan. A bit worn and torn but it’s still his Iwa-chan goddammit.

He is as wrecked as Tooru saw him in the dream, broken beyond recognition and that is when everything gives way to a tidal of boiling tears.

_‘He’s not broken. I can piece him back together.’_

Every thought in his head is as frantic and illogical as the last.

_‘I can put you back together, wake up.’_

The neon flatline on his heart rate monitor is too vivid for this white room. It burns Tooru's eyes.

There are still nurses flitting about Hajime.

Tooru asks them softly if he can have some time alone.

They glance between Hajime's grotesque form, still visible under the thin translucent sheets, and him with a vague reluctance in their eyes, but yield eventually.

“Wake up,” Tooru whispers, next to him for almost hours on end. Hajime's hand in his is too cold and he doesn’t return the grip. He almost tries to shake him awake but is too scared of fracturing him worse than he already is.

_'Wake up. You’re not gone yet, are you? You’re right here.'_

Tooru doesn’t know how he falls asleep but he does, heavy with dreams beside the bed, nose filled with the scent of drying blood.

_“I’m right here,” Hajime says, from just out of his reach, arms open and waiting._

_“You are,” Tooru smiles. “You’re here, at least.”_

_He falls into his embrace. He is a solid warmth around him._

Makki and Mattsun are there when Tooru wakes up and the three of them look as irreparably broken as the dead man on the hospital bed.

There is a court case against the driver for death due to dangerous driving. The two of them sandwich Tooru, crushing him with the intensity of their support. At the first proceeding Tooru recognizes the man as one from the group near the ER. He looks so guilty and despairing about the whole situation that it makes him sick to the stomach. He wants to disappear to the toilet to retch out my insides but he needs to hear the case. Needs the man to be convicted.

The jury leans towards a minimum sentence.

Court lets out and as soon as the man turns the corner to the courthouse, Tooru grabs him by the arm. He seems surprised by the touch until he sees the face it's attached to. Tooru had to testify as the significant other of the victim.

“I’m sorry,” the man says, his face slackening with weary remorse.

“Don’t you dare say that to me,” Tooru spits back. His voice starts small but it gets louder with the weight of his words. “You have no fucking right.”

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to–”

“YOU KILLED HIM, YOU KILLED HIM. YOU DON’T DESERVE TO BE LET GO, YOU KILLED HIM.”

Tooru doesn’t know when they got here, but he feels the dig of Mattsun’s nails in his shoulder, pulling him back, but he's not done.

“YOU DON’T DESERVE TO BE ALIVE RIGHT NOW, YOU FUCKING MURDERER. YOU KILLED HIM.”

Everyone seems shocked by the conviction of his words, the curse in their tone. He elbows out of Mattsun’s hold to punch the driver square in the jaw.

“GIVE HIM–” Tooru grabbing him by his collar, shoving him up against the wall. “GIVE–”

The strength rushes out of him suddenly and he slumps back into Mattsun. “Give him back to me.”

Tooru hates how weak he sounds, voice cracking, and how they all look at him with concern even after he hurt them. His eyes are burning but he pins the driver down with as deadly a glare as he can manage with welling tears.

“Give him back to me.”

Don’t stare at me. Do something.

“Give him back to me, _please_.”

He blanks out.

Mattsun must have carried him home.

_“I’m right here.”_

_But he’s not. He’s crossed the river of the dead and he’s gone past that insurmountable gap and he can’t reach Tooru now._

_Tooru might drown trying to reach him._

_He might try._

Tooru's not ready to start living without him yet.

It is hard being with people who know – knew – Hajime and it is hard being with people who don’t. The only two people Tooru can feel comfortable around, even after so many months, are Makki and Mattsun but it’s unfair to make them babysit him when they knew Hajime enough to grieve just as much as he is.

Tooru hates the word grief. And mourning. And acceptance. And recovery.

He doesn’t want to recover.

“He’s gone, you know?” Mattsun asks, from across the kitchen counter, stirring his tea.

“I’m not a child. I know it.”

“Gone.” Makki says the next part quieter, almost like he doesn’t want to be saying it. Like he hates the fact that the words are coming out of his mouth. “And he’s not going to come back.”

They had been tiptoeing around this for a while, but apparently now was the time for harsh words. Tooru had been living less than half of his days in reality, after all, preferring to dream.

“He might. I could just go to him.”

Their eyes blow wide with fear. A cup falls and shatters.

Makki grabs his arms, desperate. “Do _not_ say that,” he hisses, and it’s anything but angry.

“Do not fucking say that,” Mattsun repeats. His hand trembles as he sets down his own mug and drags it down his face. His voice is thick when he speaks again. “We can’t lose you, too.”

Makki’s hands slowly release Tooru's arms only to end up wrapped around him again. They’ve misunderstood.

“I only meant I could see him in my dreams,” Tooru says softly. Mattsun steps around the counter to ruffle his hair and settle his arms around both of them. “I see him whenever I sleep. It’s like I’m chasing him.”

“Don’t chase him. Don’t dream too much,” Makki whispers.

“I have to. I need to see him.”

“You have to stop.”

“I can’t.”

Their grip on him tightens as if he might fall through and break.

Makki and Mattsun move into their (his) apartment after that. They’re too scared to leave Tooru alone.

Living with them helps. Somewhat. It distracts Tooru from each vivid memory of Hajime left in this apartment, replacing it with their bustling and constant questions and incessant nagging. He is derailing their lives, by taking up so much of their time, but they never mention that.

Nights are short in the middle of winter so Tooru sleeps into the day. They try not to wake him as they head off to work at the beginning. But Tooru sleeps like the dreams are a drug and they are afraid he'll get addicted.

Soon, he's only allowed to sleep when they do.

_“I’m right here.”_

_“I know. I’m coming, I swear. Wait for me.”_

_As soon as he says it, as soon as he takes a single step, Hajime seems a whole mile away._

_But Tooru can still see with perfect clarity the moment the car makes contact with Hajime's side and drags him under the wheels. It’s in even more horrific detail than the very first time, the impact loud, motions excruciatingly slow, and he can't look away. The dream forces him to watch. He's screaming again, between ragged breaths._

He wakes up like that, struggling for breath, struggling to fight away the loop of his body being sucked under and bloodied. He sobs and heaves and screams his throat raw.

The door of the room bursts open within seconds but he can barely move his head to see the two of them rush. He can’t do much of anything but yell and cry. His body weighs down like lead as Makki pulls him into his arms, leaning him against his chest. Everything is a haze of that moment rewound and replayed – as soon as he quiets down, it reappears in his mind again. Makki is carding his fingers through his hair, rocking him back and forth but he can’t feel it, not really. He can tell Makki’s saying something, humming incessant reassurances, which he's sure would help if he could actually hear them over the buzzing in his ears and his own screeching.

Mattsun’s disappeared somewhere. Gone. Gone. Gone. Tooru's brain dares to supply him the image of Mattsun under the car and he almost pukes right there on the bed.

He does vomit on the bed seconds later, right onto himself and Makki.

His throat is burning from all the crying and the bile forcing itself up and his eyes burn from crying so much and his cheeks burn from yelling and he feels like he's on fire. He's scorching himself alive and Makki and Mattsun are in the blast zone and he doesn’t want to kill them. He really doesn’t want to kill them.

It makes him cry even harder and it’s so difficult doing both the crying and the vomiting that he starts choking and wheezing through it. Makki seems frozen and unsure for all of one second before he gathers himself up and drags him to the bathroom. He calls for Mattsun to sit by Tooru at the toilet while he washes whatever clothes have been soiled.

Tooru retches into the toilet for almost half an hour, Mattsun rubbing circles onto his back, coughing up dredges that probably aren’t there. It’s sobering, the tile on his shins and the cold air on his arms and the sleep-deprived bags under their eyes as they smile encouragingly at him.

Makki sits on the bed while Tooru tries to sleep after that, resting on the headboard to get some shut-eye himself, palm fixed on Tooru's hair. He resembles a mother with her child, and while it used to be something he joked about, now Tooru can see it. They’re both so scared for him.

He can’t do this anymore, not to them, not to himself.

“I… I really have to stop, don’t I?”

Makki crushes Tooru's hand but he knows it’s in support.

“We’ll take you to therapy.”

“Thank you.” It’s so quiet he fears they might not hear it but they’re listening. They’re always listening; Tooru rarely speaks these days.

He owes it to all three of them to try.

Makki and Mattsun accompany him to the first session and stay the whole time, in case he freaks out. They drop him off the second time, asking if he wants them to stay. He says yes. By the third session, he thinks he feels confident enough to stay on my own, but halfway through the words burn in his mouth and breathing turns hard, and he calls Makki, begging them to come back. When he says he's fine in a shaky voice before the fifth session they sit through it with him anyway, leaving for small five then ten minute periods until they're satisfied he's okay. They still walk him there. By the ninth, he assures them he'll go there himself.

They are a constant in his attempts at progress and for that, he cannot be more thankful. But every time the three of them are together, there is a glaring hole in their hold that is impossible to ignore.

_“I’m right here.”_

_Tooru wants him to be. He really, really wishes he were._

_“YOU’RE NOT YOU’RE NOT YOU’RE NOT”_

_“I’m right here.”_

_“STOP SAYING THAT.”_

_His arms are still open and it takes every drop of will to not run into them._

_“I wish you were here but you’re gone. Stop saying that.”_

_Hajime doesn’t reply because he can’t. This isn’t even him, it’s some memory Tooru's playing in his head like a broken record. It’s what he said to him the night he had the dream. It’s what he meant every time his arms stretched wide in an invitation or wrapped around him in the night. It’s him, in some sort of all-encompassing way in his grief-addled mind._

_It’s a memory._

_He’s a memory._

_Stop._

_Tooru can’t let his brain fall back to the events. The exact process of how he became one._

_“I’m righ–”_

_“STOP! JUST STOP!”_

“Are you still having those dreams?”

“Yeah.” The disappointment on Makki’s face is apparent but it softens when he notices how dreary Tooru looks. Like these aren’t dreams but nightmares.

“You don’t need to keep dreaming them. You can stop it, if you try.”

Tooru nods. He had been trying not to let them go. It was a different kind of parting he couldn’t bear. Makki gives him a push and he runs with it.

He doesn’t run away; he runs towards.

“You can stop now.”

He can.

_“I’m right here.”_

_“Yeah, you are,” Tooru says, voice on the edge of cracking._

_He holds Hajime to his chest as Hajime holds him and…_

_Hajime dissolves into stardust, infusing into Tooru's veins, settling into his heart. And he’s so, so warm in Tooru's blood, like when he cuddled against him in their bed rather than hugging him in this cold plain. Tooru breathes in once, trying to keep it even._

_On the breath out, he let the tears fall freely and carry him into consciousness._

Tooru needs to find the driver.

He finds the number in the recent tab and not the contacts because he never bothered to save it and calls the man to the café just off the university campus, a popular one, so he knows Tooru's not going to try the whole emotional trauma stunt again.

They're seated facing each other at a secluded booth in the back of the shop – with a comfortable number of eyes on them, not active, but Tooru knows that the workers are keeping tabs on patrons as normal and a few customers have taken note of the uncommon visitors and the uncommon pair. Tooru is drilling holes into his iced chocolate and the man follows his cue, keeping his eyes trained on his own cup – espresso? Latte? Tooru doesn’t remember. Is he supposed to? He can’t work up the courage or dignity to look him in the eye.

“What did you call me for, boy?” The man tries tentatively. Tooru takes the created opportunity as best he can.

“I wanted to say…” It’s still hard to talk about this. The dream wasn’t a buy-one-fix-all. “I just wanted to say, I know you didn’t mean to kill him.”

The man stares at him, mouth agape. Tooru can see tears welling in his eyes, coating them in a glossy sheen.

“And, I’m sorry. I had no right to say those things about you or to try to hurt you. I know this isn’t a good excuse but I lost him and it hurt so much and I– he– He was the best parts of me, you know? He was stopping me from doing those kinds of things for so long I couldn’t stop myself. I’m sorry. I’m so, so sorry.”

“You have nothing to be sorry for.” His voice is a gentle and comforting thing.

“That’s not true. I’m sorry.”

“Lift your head, boy. You have nothing to be sorry for.”

“You are such a good man. I’m sorry.”

“We are both good people. You are sorry for blaming me and I am so sorry for taking him away from you. We are good people despite this.”

We are good people.

Hajime was a good person. Tooru can try to be as well.

“Sorry, it took so long. I’m finally here,” Tooru says, laying the flowers against the freshly engraved headstone.

 _You were wherever people needed you_ , it reads.

Tooru hopes he's sleeping soundly amongst the stars.


End file.
